6/11 THE U.S. AND ISRAEL’S ‘OBSESSION’ WITH IRAN – THE REAL REASONS

Douglas Reeds book concluded the same- Middle East wars would happen- to create a GREATER ISRAEL Spreading Talmudic Govt.

Actually, it’s not so much that the U.S. and Israel are seemingly ‘obsessed’ with Iran, but more that the neoconservative’s of the U.S. and Israel’s right-wing Zionists are. However, this apparent obsession is only a deliberately created illusion. Israel’s real obsession is the creation of a Greater Israel and the destruction of those that prevent Israel’s expansionist dreams; Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon, both of who are supported by Iran.

The stated casus belli for any Israeli/US attack on Iran will be that Iran is building a nuclear weapon with which it intends to ‘wipe Israel off the map’. The ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ and the ‘wipe Israel off the map’ are two memes that have gone hand in hand in the propaganda and rhetoric of Israel’s Zionists and their neoconservative allies in the US and, indeed, around the world for years.

There are, however, a range of problems with these allegations. Firstly, there is, despite the constant barrage of assertions to the contrary, no actual physical evidence whatsoever that Iran actually has a ‘nuclear weapons program’. Time and time again, Israel and their allies have made the accusations but have never been able to support their allegations with any hard irrefutable evidence. All of the ‘evidence’ so far has been either vaguely circumstantial, hearsay based on statements from dissidents and defectors, straight out lies or simply conclusions based on wishful thinking and vivid imaginations.

Secondly, the ‘wipe Israel of the map’ meme is a deliberate mistranslation of a statement by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that said nothing of the sort. It was the neoconservative organisation MEMRI that was responsible for the deliberate mistranslation of the ‘wipe Israel of the map’ line which has been used extensively by neoconservatives and Israelis ever since to invoke hatred of Iran and to infer an existential threat against Israel from Iran. Still, though, Israel and the US insist that Iran is intent on producing a nuclear weapon that it plans to use against Israel and possibly even against America.

Which brings us to the third problem with the allegations ranged against Iran and that is; why would Iran, even if it did have a nuclear weapon, risk utter and swift destruction by the US and Israeli retaliatory nuclear strikes if it were to ever attack Israel with a nuclear weapon? The answer, of course is; it wouldn’t – and the Israelis and the US are well aware of it. They are also well aware that in reality Iran has no nuclear weapons program.

So why all the fuss? The hope is that with the aid of a compliant Western mainstream media, the propaganda memes of ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ and wants to ‘wipe Israel off the map’ repeated over and over endlessly will eventually so influence public opinion that it will support an attack against Iran.

The ‘Iranian problem’ is presented to the world via the mainstream media in its most simplistic form. It runs thus: ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program with which it wishes to wipe Israel off the map so the answer is to destroy its weapons making capabilities using military action’.

That’s the rhetoric and the propaganda. The reality is this: Israel and the US have no real interest in Iran’s nuclear program; their real aim as far as Iran is concerned is to destroy the Islamic regime and replace it with one that is US and Israel friendly.

Attacking Iran and affecting regime change kills a number of birds with one stone. It puts an end to what Israel and the US regard as Iran’s influence in the region, but, most important as far as the Israelis and their supporters are concerned, is that an attack against Iran provides, so they hope the world will believe, a legitimate pretext for attacking Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon on the basis that the Israelis are pre-empting a strike by Hamas and Hezbollah against Israel in retaliation of Israel’s attack against Iran.

Since the only way the US and Israel will be able to affect ‘regime change’ in Iran without the use of an invasion and occupation – unthinkable considering that Iran is more than three and a half times the size of Iraq and has about two and a half times the population – is by bombing it into capitulation and surrender, one can expect a campaign that will be far more than a load of bunker-buster bombs aimed at Iran’s nuclear facilities. Much more likely is a campaign of significant attacks against Iran’s defence and governmental institutions as well as its nuclear facilities; attacks that will deliberately inflict significant ‘co-lateral damage’ on civilians as the Iranian authorities get accused of using civilians as ‘human shields’. The hope always with this strategy is that the civilian population will then press their government to end the war by capitulating to their enemies demands. The only problem with this strategy is that it rarely ever works. Usually when such all-out bombing campaigns are carried out with the view to getting the enemy to sue for peace, rather than suing for peace, a phenomenon known as ‘Kriegssozialismus’ sets in whereby people from all walks of civilian life spontaneously ignore their ordinary class affiliations and come together to help each other out in circumstances where all are suffering equally due to war, and, importantly, collectively stiffen their resolve to resist the enemies actions rather than cave into them. Short of using nuclear weapons to defeat Iran, the US and Israel stand no hope of defeating the people of Iran.

There is also a problem of logistics in attacking Iran. Over the years that the threat of attack has prevailed, there have been reports that have suggested that Israel will ‘go it alone’ if they feel threatened enough by Iran’s ‘nuclear weapon program’. One report recently even suggested that the US is “concerned that Israel will not warn them before taking action against Iran’s nuclear facilities”. This is all rhetorical nonsense dished up for public consumption. The reality is that it would be impossible for Israel to launch an entirely unilateral attack against Iran without US connivance.

In any attack they mount, Israel will use American aircraft which constantly require spare parts mostly from the US. They will also require ordnance which also mostly comes from the US; they will require vast quantities of military jet fuel, and, if Israel plans to attack Hamas and Hezbollah at the same time, it will also require massive amounts of diesel fuel to power up its ground forces. All of this comes from the US and, as was recorded in August 2010, Israel has already ordered that fuel which would by now have been delivered and stockpiled.

The other major logistic hurdle Israel needs to overcome is the one of getting to and from its target. Israel is separated from Iran by at least two other countries; Syria and Iraq or Jordan and Iraq. Either way, this amounts to a round rip of around 3000kms to bomb Bushehr and/or Qom, Iran’s two main nuclear facilities. The most likely route would be via Syria who would be unlikely to offer any resistance to Israeli overflights – especially if it came under attack itself. Then there is the question of overflying Iraq. The Iraqi government on its own is unlikely to allow Israeli aircraft to overfly their territory. Israel would need to be in cohorts with the US if it wished to get the US to convince the Iraqi government to allow Israeli aircraft into its airspace. And not only would Israel need to have Iraqi permission to pass through its airspace, it would also need to use Iraqi airspace for in-flight refuelling operations which the Israelis would need to utilise since their strike aircraft do not have the range to do the job in one round trip without refuelling.

The question then is; what exactly is Israel’s intended endgame?

Such a massive attack against all of its enemies at once is a huge commitment on Israeli resources and one of very high risk. It will, therefore, need to be decisive in terms of meeting all of its war aims.

Israel will have learnt the lessons of its past failures. After years of attacks against Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, Israel has not been able to destroy Hezbollah or Hamas. In the event of an attack against Iran, Israel is likely to simultaneously mount hitherto unprecedented attacks against both Hamas and Hezbollah. Such a strike will likely be opened up with a massive aerial and artillery barrage and then, since Israel does not have to commit ground forces to attacking Iran, it will be able to invade and occupy the Gaza Strip and south Lebanon up to the Latani River. At the same time, Israel is likely to fully occupy all of the West Bank in order to prevent any uprising by Palestinian resistance there and remilitarise the Golan Heights to prevent any backlash there.

In short, for Israel an attack against Iran and Israel’s other enemies on the pretext of pre-empting an immediate threat to its own existence will be the do or die action it will take in order to realise Zionism’s ultimate endgame; the creation of a Greater Israel.

The coming confrontation is not about Iran being a threat; it is about Israel ridding itself of all of its enemies in the places that it would like to annex as part of its realisation of creating a permanent Greater Israel nation abundant with fertile lands, its own water resources, and living space. War is its pretext.

Friday, November 04, 2011IS THE ‘FINAL CONFRONTATION’ NOW IMMINENT?
This post is a modified version of a post that I wrote back in June of 2008. What I wrote then is just as valid today as it was then.

Those pushing for war against Iran argue, despite the total lack of any evidence to support their claims, that Iran has a nuclear weapons program and that they will use their nuclear weapons, once they have them, against Israel. Their allegations are reinforced by what they say, quite falsely, are President Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric about ‘wiping Israel off the map’.

All of this is merely propaganda and neither Israel nor the US or even the International Atomic Energy Authority, the UNs nuclear watchdog, can produce any evidence whatsoever to support Israeli and US claims about Iran’s so-called nuclear weapons program. [Update: An imminent report due next week from the IAEA will still not provide any hard actual evidence of Iran having a nuclear weapons program. The ‘evidence’ the IAEA will produce will only be statements fro various dissidents and defectors who claim to have knowledge of a nuclear weapons program, and some vague references to Iran supposedly researching trigger devices for nuclear warheads.]

The reality is this: Israel and their supporters have been carrying on about Iran’s nuclear ambitions for years and threats to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities were being made long before Ahmadinejad became President of Iran in August, 2005. Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric has merely been a reaction to Israel’s bellicose stance towards Iran and, with a little careful massaging of translations of his speeches by the neoconservative think tank, MEMRI, has provided much fodder for the Israel/neocon propaganda machine. However, the real reason Israel wants to attack Iran is not because of Iran’s ‘nuclear weapons program’ – it simply doesn’t have one – nor is it because Ahmadinejad has said he wants to ‘wipe Israel off the map’ – he never said any such thing – it is because Iran supports both Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Palestinian territories and Syria who are seeking to have the Golan Heights returned to them. What Israel and the US and their neoconservative allies really want is ‘regime change’ in Iran. They want an Iran that has an Israel and US friendly government so that Israel can continue in its quest to create a Greater Israel without having to worry about Iran supporting those that are resisting Israeli expansionism.

In the event of Israel and the US attacking Iran, one can expect to see not just Iran’s nuclear facilities destroyed, indeed, that will be just a minor part of the operation, but there will also be major attacks against Iranian military targets including air bases, missile storage areas, barracks, etc. Iran’s communications systems and government buildings will also likely be targeted. In short, the Iranian government would be bombed into capitulation.

One can also expect Israel to launch an attack, probably simultaneously with the assault on Iran, against Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Israel may also attack Syria pre-emptively on the basis that Syria has a mutual assistance treaty with Iran and despite the current domestic problems Syria is experience. The resulting conflict could have a devastating effect both on the region and around the world. As well as bringing death and destruction to countless Iranians, Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians, many Israelis may also die as Iran launches missiles in a counter attack against Israel, a move that could escalate rapidly if Israel decided to its use nuclear weapons against Iran in retaliation to an Iranian counter attack.

The economic consequences for the rest of the world could also be catastrophic. Oil prices, already at record levels due to the uncertainties prevailing in the region, would play havoc with economies world wide.

Then there are the unknowns. How, for example, will Russia, a supplier of nuclear equipment to Iran, and China, a customer of Iran’s resources, react to such an attack? How will the UN handle a pre-emptive assault against Iran? How will the governments of the other Arab states react? How will the peoples of the other Arab states react? What will happen in Iraq, already destroyed by over half a decade of fighting?

The world, somehow, is not reacting to the prospect of war in the same way as it did during the build-up to the invasion of Iraq. The reason for that is; the world knew the invasion of Iraq was coming, but this time around there is no overt preparations for war against Iran in the way that there was against Iraq. There is even a feeling that the US simply wouldn’t be stupid enough to do it again after the disaster of Iraq. The problem is, however, that the extreme right-wing of the US and Israel are convinced of their own self-righteousness and that all will go according to their plans.

It’s a frightening scenario. The Middle East could erupt into catastrophic war at any tick of the clock but the world doesn’t seem to think its going to happen.

Sooner or later it will. Israel’s ultimate endgame is for regime change in Iran which, in turn, will deny Hamas and Hezbollah of its ability to resist Israel’s quest for a Greater Israel. War against Iran is the only way Israel’s Zionists will be able to realise their dream.

The coming confrontation hasn’t got anything to do with Iran’s so-called nuclear weapons program; it has everything to do with Israel’s desire to create a Greater Israel and rid itself of its enemies once and for all.

Thursday, October 27, 2011IRAN: THE NEOCONS HAVE BECOME CONFUSED AS THEY PUSH FOR ACTION
Yesterday, Jonathan Tobin at Commentary wrote:

With the International Atomic Energy Agency set to release a new report next month detailing Iran’s efforts to create a nuclear weapon, Tehran’s main protector in the international community is making a last ditch effort to squelch the watchdog group’s efforts to blow the whistle on this threat.

Russia announced today it opposed the IAEA’s plans to publish a report about the military implications of Iran’s illegal push for nukes.

Tobin goes on to write:

Since the beginning of the last decade, Iran has played Western diplomats for fools with Russian assistance.

While Tobin conceded that “the Russians have as much reason to fear a nuclear Iran as anyone else”, Tobin claimed that Russian support for Iran was because Prime Minister Putin “believes anything that thwarts American foreign policy goals constitutes a win for his government”.

This didn’t seem to make any sense. On the one hand Tobin – as well as other neocons and their allies – is accusing Russia of helping Iran cover up what they think is Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, while at the same time saying that a nuclear-armed Iran would not be in Russia’s interest any more than anyone elses. Why would they help Iran cover up their so-called nuclear weapons program?

In order to clarify Tobin’s stance, I emailed him. I wrote:

What you are saying, Jonathan, is tantamount to suggesting that Russia is complicit in aiding Iran to become nuclear armed. I wonder, can you explain how a nuclear armed Iran would be in Russia’s interest?And, even if it were in Russia’s interest, would it not be easier for Russia to simply supply Iran with the nuclear arms you say it seeks?

His response was even more confusing than his article. He replied:

As I wrote, a nuclear Iran is not in Russia’s interest. But its delight in thwarting American policy aims seems to trump common sense in this case. Russia has been Iran’s chief enabler in international diplomacy as their effort to suppress the IAEA report shows. While Russia knows better than to give Iran nukes, a Middle East in which Iran displaces the U.S. as a power is one that they may think they can live with.

The response provided more questions than answers. I wrote back to him saying:

May I take this a little further since your reasoning seems to be contradictory. We can agree that a nuclear armed Iran is not in Russia’s interest, but how can Iran ‘displace the US as a power’ without being nuclear armed? And, if it’s not in Russia’s interest, how is it that Russia could ‘live with’ that?

I’m still, not unsurprisingly, awaiting his reply.

Thursday, October 13, 2011IRAN: IS CONFRONTATION NEAR AT HAND?
In recent days America has accused Iran of plotting to commit an act of war on American soil by assassinating a Saudi Arabian diplomat. The first question one would need to ask is: why on earth would Iran commit such a deliberate act of war against the US and Saudi Arabia?

And the answer, of course is: they simply wouldn’t.

Yet, this is exactly the ludicrous scenario that the US administration is hoping the world of will accept. “We’re in the process of uniting world public opinion continuing to isolate and condemn their behavior. Nothing has been taken off the table,” vice–President Joe Biden told ABC News on the ‘Good Morning America’ show.

Robert Baer, an ex-CIA intelligence analyst specializing in Iranian affairs, however, has doubts about the veracity of the report about an Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador in Washington, DC, saying that the plot is “completely out of character” for the Iranians.

Apart from a load of wild accusations and an arrest of one of the so-called plotters, the US has not provided any evidence whatsoever of any plot. It seems to be yet another case of ‘we have said it has happened and, therefore, it has’. The world is then expected to believe it just on that basis despite having been gullible enough to have fallen for this nonsense so many times before.

Two questions remain unanswered. First, my original one: why would Iran do such a thing: and two, why would the US want to accuse Iran of plotting such an outrageous act knowing that it could lead to war?

As readers of my blog will be aware, I have warned for some time of a coming confrontation between Iran and Israel and its allies. For years, the Israelis and the US together with their other Western allies have accused Iran of having a nuclear weapons program. And for just as many years, not a skerrick of evidence has ever been produced to support the claims. Iran has consistently claimed that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only in order to produce electrical energy and for medical purposes. And, contrary to claims by the US, Iran has allowed the IAEA access to all of its facilities and no evidence has ever been found that supports the accusation that Iran has a ‘nuclear weapons program’.

While the US continues to claim that Iran does have a nuclear weapons program, it does so purely to maintain the propaganda rhetoric; it certainly doesn’t have any hard evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program that would justify it attacking Iran. It is for this reason that the US has resorted to making other accusations about Iran’s hostility toward the US – and in this case, has also attempted to wedge an already extremely fragile relationship between Saudi Arabia and Iran into the bargain.

The reality is that Iran is in no position to provoke a war against either Israel or the US. Both Israel and the US, however, would gain extensively from a war that resulted in regime change in Iran.

If the US attacked Iran, say, on the pretext that Iran threatened to commit an act of war against the US, then Israel would be provided with a pretext to attack Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip on the basis that they would be pre-empting a retaliatory strike by Hezbollah and Hamas who are Iran’s allies. And just for good measure, the Israelis would also launch a full scale invasion and full military occupation of the West Bank in order, so they would tell the world, to prevent hostile Palestinian elements taking up arms against Israel and the Israeli settlers in the West Bank. While the American attack against Iran would take the world’s centre stage, the Israeli reaction to an American attack against Iran – attacks against Hezbollah and Hamas – would be seemingly only of minor significance compared to the war against Iran whereas in fact the entire war is really is about Israel’s desire to rid itself of its enemies once and for all and thus go some way to realising their dream of creating a Greater Israel.

The fact is; Iran is not at all a threat to the US and never can be, but while Iran supports Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran will always be there to thwart Israel’s dreams of a Greater Israel.

Only a full on war against Hezbollah and Hamas and regime change in Iran will give the Zionists of Israel what they have yearned for since 1948. And that can only be achieved by America attacking Iran.

Saturday, October 01, 2011COULD TARGETED ASSASSINATIONS LEGITIMISE TIT-FOR-TAT KILLINGS OF THE LEADERS OF THE BELLIGERENTS?
I’ve spent much of the day reading a dozen or so newspaper articles, opinion pieces and commentaries on the pros and cons of the killing of American citizen and Jihadist, Anwar al Awlaki, who died in Yemen yesterday after being targeted by a Hellfire missile fired from an American operated drone aircraft.

The left and the civil and human rights folk together with folk from the libertarian right have condemned the killing as illegal and unconstitutional, while the right-wing, led noisily by the neoconservatives, have praised the killing as a victory and argued that in time of war such killings are quite justified.

What’s missing from all of these arguments from both sides is the fact that such extra-judicial killings can work two ways. No matter what the rights and wrongs of these kinds of killings are, it means that if it’s okay for the US and its allies to kill their enemies in this way, then its okay for the enemy to do likewise and kill American leaders and leaders of American allies; and since the President of the United States also happens to be the Commander in Chief of American forces, he now becomes a quite legitimate target by exactly the same virtues and logic that the President viewed al Awlaki to be a legitimate target.

Targeted assassinations, of course, are nothing new; the Israelis have quite famously and openly attempted to legitimise the extra-judicial killing of its non-combatant enemies for years. It could even be argued from an historical point of view that Israel’s long history of not very seriously challenged policy of targeted assassinations has paved the way for the Americans to do likewise. Whilst the practise has caused outrage in the past, that outrage hadn’t stopped the killings – killings which continue almost daily in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere against Islamic militants, both combatant and non-combatant. Today, people have become so war-weary they have become immune to more news about such killings. In the case of the latest killing, the uproar is because al Awlaki was an American citizen but this too will soon become just another killing that will usher in a new era of Americans killing Americans justified solely on the basis that they are a threat to security.

One wonders how long it will be before a militant will be targeted and killed in America itself simply because he represents ‘a threat to security’.

And one wonders how long it will be before American and Israeli leaders are themselves targeted by their enemies.

Wednesday, September 28, 2011ANDREW BOLT: GUILTY OF RACISM!
In a landmark victory for multiculturalism in Australia, a Melbourne court today found Murdoch propagandist Andrew Bolt guilty of breaching the racial discrimination act.

While many, including those who detest Bolt’s ideology and writings, have stated that the decision is a blow against freedom of speech, the reality is that it’s actually more of a blow to those that abuse the freedom of speech in order to peddle their scaremongering extreme right-wing ideology of hate and racism.

People like Bolt and his other racist cohorts at the various Murdoch publications including Tim Blair, Piers Akerman, et al, are going to have to think twice before hitting the keyboards to spout their hatreds.

The “Baruch Plan” is of such importance to this narrative that a glance at Mr. Baruch’s entire background and life is appropriate.

He was always generally assumed to be of the aristocratic Jewish type, that is to say, of Sephardic descent leading back, by way af the experience in Spain and Portugal, to a remote possibility of Palestinian arigin. In fact, as he himself stated (February 7, 1947) his father was “a Polish Jew who came to this country a hundred years ago”. That places Mr. Baruch among the Slavic Ashkenazi, the non-semitic “Eastern Jews”, who are now said (by the Judaist statisticians) to comprize almost the whole of Jewry.

PALESTINIANS ARE THE SEMITE PEOPLE NOT THE JEWS THAT ARE PUSHING THEM OFF THEIR LAND.

CHRISTIAN ZIONIST ARE ABSOLUTE NUTTERS

Mr. Baruch’s influence on state policy may be clearly traced, and it is a significant one, discouraging to those who hope for Jewish “involvement in Mankind”, for up to that time he seemed to be (and presumably wished to appear) a fully integrated American, a paragon of Jewish emancipation, tall, handsome, venerable and greatly successful in his affairs.

If Mr. Baruch’s “change” was as sudden as Dr. Weizmann’s narrative suggests, another incident of that period makes it appear also to have been radical, even violent. One of the most extreme Zionist chauvinists in America then was a Mr. Ben Hecht, who once published the following dictum:

“One of the finest things ever done by the mob was the crucifixion of Christ. Intellectually it was a splendid gesture. But trust the mob to bungle. If I’d had charge of executing Christ I’d have handled it differently. You see, what I’d have done was had him shipped to Rome and fed to the lions. They never could have made a saviour out of mincemeat”.

During the period of violence in Palestine which culminated in the pogrom of Arabs at Deir Yasin, this Mr. Hecht inserted a full-page advertisement in many of the leading newspapers throughout America. It was addressed “T o the Terrorists of Palestine” and included this message:

“The Jews of America are for you. You are their champions . . . Every time you blow up a British arsenal, or wreck a British railroad train sky high, or rob a British bank, or let go with your guns and bombs at the British betrayers and invaders of your homeland, the Jews of America make a little holiday in their hearts”.

It was the author of this advertisement (according to his autobiography) whom Mr. Baruch chose to visit and inform of his affinity and support:

“One day the door of my room opened and a tall white-haired man entered. It was Bernard Baruch, my first Jewish social visitor. He sat down, observed me for a moment and then spoke. ‘I am on your side’, said Baruch, ‘the only way the Jews wil1 ever get anything is by fighting for it. I’d like you to think of me as one of your Jewish fighters in the tal1 grass with a long gun. I’ve always done my best work that way, out of sight’.”